Sunday, February 24, 2013

Neuchatel 4

Wow, lots of questions. I am still loosing weight, though the members love to give us chocolate, and the chocolate is sooo soo soo soos oos oos soo good here, but yes I am running usually every other morning.  Sometimes all four of us go, sometimes just two at a time.  Elder Sorhaitz is the only one with the willpower to go every morning.  To give you an example.  there is a shirt here that another missionary left behind (a p-day shirt)  that I tried on and fits really well, I looked at the size, and it's a medium!  I don't remember ever wearing a medium shirt.
Yes I still have the guitar, and I played it in the mission office with the assistants and president, just so you know that it is approved.

Keyboards in Switzerland are almost the same as they are in the states, but the y and the z are switched, and there are a lot more symbol keys to do léttèrs wïth äcçènts, and the things like the ? ' and ! are in different places.  Also I got used to the french keyboards which are even more different than the swiss ones.

No we are in the same time zone, but we go to the church in Bienne in the morning to do emails, we study on the train, and do the rest of our studies at church.  The other Elders take the computer at the neuchâtel ward so, we go here:  Then the german elders just came by... so it looks like there isn't enough room for the both of us.  They said they would come back in an hour or so, so that was nice of them.

After this, we do our shopping in Bienne (because for some reason the shops are closed until 1 in Neuchatel) Grab lunch and get back to Neuchatel around 1 oclock to play soccer with the other equipe of missionaries.  That's what we did last p-day anyway.  It seemed to work.  Did you know that I love playing soccer now?  I suck, but it is way fun.  Maybe it is because I don't get winded after 2 minutes, or I have no other video games or what have you.  I really like it though.  Today some other missionaries are coming for exchanges, so we are all going to play together today.  If the weather holds up.  it snowed last night, but there was snow the last time, and we just borrowed a shovel from a catholic church and shoveled the field (it was an astro-turf field)

I have yet to try any uniquely swiss cheese, but I here Racclete was invented here, and I loved it in france, so maybe we'll have to see how that is.  By the way, the kebabs here, way expensive (8 franks is really reasonable compared to 4 euros in France)  However, they kick butt compared to France's kebabs, holy cow, they are unbelievable, and less greasy and more veggies inside.  They are almost like the gyros mother would get at crown burger, but mixed with that kebab magic.

Yes we have a phone.  We didn't have one when we got here because it was waiting for us in the apartment, that's the only reason we didn't get it when we arrived.

Communication was pretty limited between other Elders in France, and it is pretty much all cut off here, because it is too expensive to call international, it isn't on our phone budget, so no talking with anyone in France.  In our district, I am the only American (Well E Sorhaitz  has a french passport, but he is American in every other way, his dad is french, but he didn't even speak french before the mission. In my zone, I am one of ... two Americans, so it is a little different.  French swiss is split into two stakes, Lausan stake which is everywhere in french speaking swiss except Geneva, and Geneva stake which also includes a few French wards like Annecy and Animace etc.I love switzerland, but I kinda miss France.  I like a lot of things more here like how swiss people are actually proud to be swiss, and they believe in God, unlike the French, but I feel like France has a charm and warmth to it.  The people here are... like i said proud, which isn't all bad, but I feel as though the people of france are starting to be humbled because of the bad economy and the crummy state that many are living in.  Here, they are not humble, but I've noticed people are still more religious... I  don't know it is hard to explain.

Because of E Ihalmo's extra studies, we just do them all in one go in the morning (whereas elsewhere we would spread them through the day)  this takes us to 12 to get all the studies done, then we eat, and take the train and are in Bienne from about 1:45- 2 till our train to come home at 8:19 or 8:52  We usually eat late, though, when we are really hungry during the day, we'll grab a cheap sandwich from a grocery store, or a kebab.

Yes E ihalmo and I sleep in the same room.  The other elders have their own room as well.  And we even have our own walk-in closet, nice apartment.

In church when there were 17 people, we taught priesthood, then class des amis, then blessed the sacrament, so yeah, we did a lot ha ah.  There were a good 30 or so this week, so that is good, getting better.

Gervain and Lara are both progressing great, and are so ready to be baptized, the only problem is that the font is in Neuchatel, and there is an activity there that night, so we have to organize things around that.

There are miracles happening every day.  We saw a member family yesterday who fed us delicious African food, and then gave us  six families to go pass and teach, so there should be some new amis rolling in soon.  I love it here in Bienne.  Lots of stuff is in German, but there is still lots of French speakers who are searching for the truth... Mostly the Africans because all the white people are german speaking ha ha, but Lara is Italian, so yeah, there are a lot of Italians as well who choose to go with French because it comes easier to them than German. anyway, tote zeins to yah, I'll try to send pics.  No promises, this comp is kinda old, but I'll see what I can do.

Love you so much, keep the faith, the gospel is awesome I LOVE THE LORD! CIao, Arividercci, aufweiterzheine (however you spell that)

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